Plenty of positives as Sea Dogs begin rebuild

Michael Hawkins/Saint John Sea Dogs

SAINT JOHN - When looking at just the numbers, it wasn't a pretty season for the Saint John Sea Dogs.

But, in reality, it's fair to say the Sea Dogs exceeded expectations this year and, less than a year removed from a Memorial Cup championship, the vibe for this rebuild feels good.

Saint John snuck into the playoffs with a strong final few weeks, a late season stretch that's rare for a rebuilding team coming off an "all in" year. While the Sea Dogs lost their first round playoff series in five games to the powerhouse Gatineau Olympiques (and were outscored 30-5 in the series), the fact that they won one game is certainly impressive. Saint John played hard against Gatineau, and that's really all you can ask for in a mismatch like that.

The playoff series with Gatineau, in a way, was representative of the Sea Dogs' season as a whole. It ended in a loss, but there were a lot of small wins and positives to build off that should help this team moving forward. And playing a team like Gatineau, the Sea Dogs now really know where the bar is if they want to be a contending team again in the near future.

We are just a few hours into Saint John's off-season, but here are a few random thoughts...

• Saint John's overagers - Charlie DesRoches, Brady Burns and Alex Drover - played their final games of junior hockey Friday night. Drover will be playing university hockey next year while nothing official has come out on the status of DesRoches and Burns.
• Players who could return as overagers next season: forwards Peter Reynolds and Alexis Cournoyer; defensemen Jared Cosman and Vincent Despont; and goaltender Ventsislav Shingarov. Despont is expected to play pro hockey in Switzerland next season.
• With DesRoches and Despont (expectedly, at least) both departing, there isn't a ton of QMJHL experience on Saint John's backend. While not "true rookies" (i.e. 16-year-olds), Nate Tivey, Joseph Ianniello, Danny Akkouche and Nicolas Bilodeau were all classified as rookies this past season.
• Bilodeau's numbers got most of the attention, but Cole Burbidge had 50 points in 68 games. He's looking like a bit of a second-round steal for Saint John.
• Ventsislav Shingarov has played in 62 career QMJHL games. 55 of those were played this past season. He had a slow start to the year, but he really found his groove in the second half. If he does return as an overager, you have to think the team will want to give Olivier Brideau some more game action though.
• Peter Reynolds had an excellent second half and likely would have pushed for the team scoring lead if he had stayed healthy. He'll obviously be a key contributor to Saint John's offense next year, but you also have to think some contending teams would like his point producing abilities as well.
• Whatever pipeline the Sea Dogs have found in Ontario - Tivey, Ianniello, Noah Reinhart, Luke Benoit, etc. - seems to be a good one.
• Nico Laforge, wearing an 'A' on his sweater, was the last player off the ice Friday. Have to wonder if that 'A' will be a 'C' next year.
• Rookie import forwards Pavel Simek and Eriks Mateiko both had pretty good seasons. Saint John will have a high import pick this year, so some decisions will have to be made there.
• Jacob Beaulieu and Jeremie Richard were the only members of Saint John's 2022 draft class to spend the full season with the Sea Dogs. There should be a few players from the 2023 draft class on next year's team with Saint John picking a few times in the top four rounds.
• Travis Crickard and assistants Mark Lee and Jeff Hansen seem like a good fit for this rebuild. It feels like things are off to a good start, but now their challenge is to keep it going in an upward direction.
• Lastly, thank you to everyone who read the blog and listened to the podcast this year.